How do I love thee? Let me count the miles...

It's not possible (in my opinion) to go through what my kids have gone through and not have some feelings about it.

And sometimes the feelings get to be a lot.

And I really mean a lot.

But boys are just so different than girls.  They apparently have limits on how much they really want to talk things out (why is that??  Talking things out is just wonderful....). But, whether or not I fully understand why they work that way, it's part of how they're wired, and I can choose to work with it or fight against it.

So, when the emotions get to be too much, we get physical at our house.  We work at punching the air or a pile of pillows, we have the kids jump on the mini-trampoline, we kick a soccer ball around, we hit the trails (after checking the weather now...), we just try to get moving.

Today, one of the kids was having a pretty rough day and feeling pretty angry.  So, the whole family went for a 3 mile walk.

Wasn't enough.

So the Angry Kid and I went for another 3 mile walk.  That's right, I walked 6 miles tonight to help the Angry Kid work out all those feelings.

I should also add that I had already worked out this morning.

Oh my word, my legs hurt tonight.  But it was such a good time of getting emotions out.  It was a good time of bonding.  And I'm glad we did it.

We started mile 1 with an angry, angry kid, with everything boiling just below the surface, about to erupt.  By mile 5, he had cooled down enough that he picked flowers for me.

He's never done that before.

I was so touched, that he wanted to pick another one for me.   But, by that time, we had passed the field where he found the first flower, and all that he could find is the weed on the left, but he gave it to me so proudly, and about beamed when I put them in my hair.

 So, mile by mile, we're walking out the feelings.  And even though it's not nearly as convenient or understandable to me as talking endlessly, I wouldn't trade the time together, or the precious weed bouquet for anything.